Thursday, 17 July 2014

Getting feedback takes a certain courage

CF declined the offer to join Adam Dickson in a triathlon but managed to track him down for a quick interview. Adam has published several books including The Butterfly Collector and Drowning by Numbers. Here’s what he had to say.

CF: What else do you do apart from writing?

AD: I’m an advisor for my partner’s PR & Marketing business, as she has many writers as clients. I used to be extremely fit, competing in triathlons and running all kinds of mad races (including Ironman UK), but have now taken the sedentary route – preferring a little light cycling and walking on Sunday.

CF: What subjects or genres do you like to read?

AD: I usually prefer contemporary fiction, but will read other genres, especially if a particular book has been recommended to me by a friend. I do tend to prefer straightforward realism as averse to fantasy, sci-fi etc. But when I’m researching for a novel, I read as many non-fiction books relating to the subject as I can to authenticate detail.

CF: Who are your favourite writers?

AD: Graham Greene for his superb craftsmanship and atmospheric novels. Other (contemporary) writers I admire are Colum McCann, Martin Amis and Philip Roth. I’m currently reading Love in the Time of Cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, an incredibly deep and powerful novel.

CF: How did you know you wanted to write?

AD: I was always good at creative writing at school and read a great deal. After a long period of inactivity, I began writing again, and found a writing tutor, Bill Stanton, who I’d met at Southampton University during a writing weekend. I stayed with Bill’s Writers’ Tutorial for about four years, learning the craft of fiction.

CF: How did you get the confidence to start?

AD: I don’t believe you need confidence to start, only the initial desire/inspiration to get the words onto the page. After that it’s a case of sticking at it and finishing each piece you start. The process of getting feedback for your work, however, does take a certain courage. Fear of rejection and criticism prevents many potentially good writers from pursuing their goals. Basically, you develop a thick skin over time. But, as I said, the initial desire has to be there in the first place or you won’t have the drive to carry on.

CF: If you can remember the day you went from non-writer to writer, how did that feel?

AD: I can’t recall a specific day when I felt like a writer. Winning a short story competition, perhaps. Receiving praise from other writers. One of the most memorable days was receiving a copy of my sports book, Triathlon – Serious About Your Sport, from the publisher New Holland. I sat with it in my hands, a beaming grin on my face. After that, it’s often the little things, like selling a book here and there, or someone coming up to you and saying, ‘I’ve just finished your novel and I loved it.’

CF: Do you find novels or short stories easier to write?

AD: I used to write short stories quite regularly, but have since fallen out of the habit. Having made novels more the focus, I suppose it’s been a case of having less time and mental energy. Both my first and second novel took a long time and many drafts to complete, leaving me with little time for anything else.

CF: How (and where) do writing ideas come to you?

AD: One thing I’m never short of is ideas. I have so many books/screenplays planned in my head that I only hope I live long enough to write them all!

CF: What writing methods and discipline do you practise?

AD: I used to have a very rigid schedule, which consisted of getting up, eating breakfast, and working solidly on one specific project for up to five hours. I might also work some evenings as well to boost output. Now, I’m more flexible. You often hear writers talking about their schedules and how they put in twelve hour days etc., but this can be misleading and not particularly helpful. The creative process needs rest, or becomes like a battery drained. I like the sporting analogy, where constant training leads to burnout. The mind needs rest, too – and a little fun if you can handle it.

CF: How much do you edit and polish?

AD: My first novel, The Butterfly Collector, took eight rewrites before it went to an editor. The second, Drowning by Numbers, took eleven. I write the first drafts longhand in notebooks, then put them away for anything up to a year before reworking them. I tend to ignore the advice that polishing a novel too much takes the spontaneity out of it. Most literary agents and publishers say that the biggest problem with most submissions they receive is that they haven’t been rewritten enough.

CF: Which do you find easier: constructing characters or building a plot?

AD: I always begin with a single character (or two), and expand on that as I go along. This would usually be during the thinking stage, before I got anything down on paper. Later, it’s the difficult task of cutting and editing, where you may wish to keep the number of characters down. Plotting is largely instinctive, for me, rather than formulaic. Tension and drama are the order of the day.

CF: What’s the hardest thing about writing for you?

AD: Staying in the chair long enough to finish. There are always reasons to leave and do something else. ‘It’s a lovely day – oh, must go out in the sunshine.’

CF: What do you most enjoy about writing?

AD: Seeing a piece of work come to life, after many dull or uninspiring drafts. Finishing a novel is a wonderful moment, knowing you’re on the home run.

CF: Do you fall into writing ‘dumps’ and, if so, how do you get out of them?

AD: I recently had to give up writing my third novel, after five extremely trying drafts. In the end, I had to accept that it just wasn’t working. At the time, I was exhausted – completely wiped out mentally and emotionally. But after, I felt a huge sense of relief, that this was the right thing to do. I’m now writing my fourth novel (which I had in early draft form), which will now become the third.

CF: If you’ve suffered rejection, what works for you in dealing with it?

AD: Action. As soon as a rejection comes in, I send two more proposals out to other agents/publishers in its place. I’ve learned that rejection isn’t personal, although it may feel that way, and that agents and publishers aren’t in league to prevent you from being published. Also, if you’ve been rejected, you’re in good company. Some of the most influential writers of our time were once picking brown envelopes off the mat and crying into their soup!

CF: What are you working on at the moment?

AD: My third novel, several screenplays, and a book on bipolar disorder.

CF: What further ambitions do you have for your writing?

AD: To reach as wide an audience as possible, and to maintain the highest possible quality. Also, to inspire other writers and help them reach their goals.

Stories came tumbling out

NF: I always had visions of being a spy. That’s possibly why I chose to study languages. The nearest I’ve got to that was sending Helen in Love Thine Enemyinto France as a member of the S.O.E. My large family of five children, thirteen grandchildren and numerous steps and halfs give ample food for thought about relationships and I get to travel to see some of them or spend holidays with them. With them I’ve enjoyed France, Italy, Greece. I love to travel, I love Europe, I love the Med. Russia’s on my list of places to go – I have a smattering of the language – and possibly Bhutan.

CF: What subjects or genres do you like to read?

NF: I enjoy reading well-written romance and historical romance. Add to these the research books I need for whatever I happen to be writing – at the moment, fourteenth-century Italy, the Black Death, and also (different WIP) Second World War, plus customs, clothes and diet for the period.

CF: Who are your favourite writers?

NF: I used to enjoy Margaret Pemberton and Noel Barber because they write lovely war stories I could only aspire to. I now enjoy contemporary writers like Christina Jones, Pamela Fudge, Veronica Henry and others who guarantee a nice bit of escapism.

CF: What subjects or genres do you like to write?

NF: I write contemporary fiction and fast-paced historical fiction. I’ve also had a go at crime fiction with Chain of Evil. I love to be so immersed that when I take a break, I’m surprised to find myself in the here and now, not in another place, another time.

CF: How did you know you wanted to write?

NF: It was required at school and uni. I soon came to realise I enjoyed the writing process itself but wanted to expand my horizons away from the purely academic.

CF: How did you get the confidence to start?

NF: It wasn’t an issue. Stories came tumbling out. It was when trying to find an agent or publisher that my confidence took a battering.

CF: If you can remember the day you went from non-writer to writer, how did that feel?

NF: It felt euphoric! A publisher wanted my book! This was only surpassed when I held my first copy in my hands.

CF: Do you find novels or short stories easier to write?

NF: I prefer writing something longer where the characters can develop and take on a life of their own. I always did want to run before I could walk.

CF: How (and where) do writing ideas come to you?

NF: They spring to mind unbidden, often in the form of a picture or scene. Walking through the local woods where I used to live brought a vast harvest of ideas.

CF: What writing methods and discipline do you practise?

NF: I’m not too methodical, probably not methodical enough. I have to fit in some translation work which brings in the pennies and which I enjoy.

CF: How much do you edit and polish?

NF: I edit and polish endlessly. The more I comb through a manuscript the more it flows. Once the story is down in rough, the real work begins. By the end of the story the characters have developed to such an extent that I feel I really know them and can fill in lots of details at the beginning of the book. When I’ve just about finished I go through the first chapter again. When that’s done, I go over the first page and finally the first paragraph.

CF: Which do you find easier: constructing characters or building a plot?

NF: They go together. As the story unfolds, a purely mental process, the characters become so familiar you just know how they would react in given circumstances.

CF: What’s the hardest thing about writing for you?

NF: Finding the time and trying to ignore the housework!

CF: What do you most enjoy about writing?

NF: Travelling in my head and meeting lovely or sometimes horrible characters of my own invention.

CF: Do you fall into writing ‘dumps’ and, if so, how do you get out of them?

NF: If I feel a bit of a writer’s block coming on I sometimes write a particularly lively scene a few chapters ahead and fill in the story in-between.

CF: If you’ve suffered rejection, what works for you in dealing with it?

NF: It used to be devastating. I’d have to wait till confidence returned and reality kicked in. Now it’s par for the course, all part and parcel of being an author.

CF: What are you working on at the moment?

NF: I’m working on a contemporary set in France and a historical set in Italy in the fourteenth century.

CF: What further ambitions do you have for your writing?

NF: I’d like to see two of my historicals made into films!!

I’ve had novels and novellas published by Hale, MWSL and Thorpe. One historical,Blackthorn Child, went straight onto Amazon Kindle where it proved a bestseller.

I’m on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. I belong to the Romantic Novelists’ Association, the Society of Authors and the Chartered Institute of Translators.

Saturday, 5 July 2014

I'm very happy to be able to say that one of my original romances, Romantic Melody, will be published by the American publisher Samhain with a sparkling new cover (below). This is how the story goes:

Dizzie Wallace was very satisfied with her life. She had her own flat, a career she enjoyed as a disc jockey, a boyfriend she was fond of, and a guardian angel in the shape of family friend, Lyle Tarrant.
But fond, she eventually realised, was not enough. What her life lacked was love, something she had not experienced since her teenage crush on Lyle years before. So, as a joke, she decided to practice her female wiles on him.
Soon she realised that she was falling in love with Lyle and, although he seemed attracted to her, he was all set to marry the beautiful Anthea.

Tuesday, 1 July 2014

Which writer has influenced you most? How?
The writer who has influenced me the most is LaVyrle Spencer – and I know
everyone will ask, ‘Who?’ She is an American author – now retired (sadly). I
aspire to make my characters live and breathe as she does. If I write even half
as well, then I’m more than very happy.

When writing your
novels, do you keep a picture in your mind of your regular readers?
The majority of my readers, female, male, young, old, and in between, are
people who will have something in common with my characters, and this is
confirmed in the feedback I receive.

Do you work out
the plot of your story before starting to write?
I don’t plot at all. I start with a scenario and usually just two characters,
throw in a few ‘what ifs,’ and just go. Plotting doesn’t work for me. I
like the surprise element, both for me and the reader!

Do you base your stories
on real life experiences or are they totally fictitious?
I never write about my family or friends specifically. My novels
are all totally fictitious but as anyone will tell you, the one thing
about family life – real or made up - is that it’s never dull.

You give a lot of talks
about your books. Has this changed your perspective in any way?
I really enjoy giving talks but I wouldn’t say that doing this has changed my
perspective in any way. It took me quite a long time and attempts at various
other genres to decide on the one that best suited me and my style of writing.
It was when I started writing what I wanted to read that I found success as a
novelist.

What single piece of
advice would you give someone starting out on a writing career now?
The single piece of advice I would give to someone starting out on a writing
career now would be to join a good writing class or course. If I hadn’t
enrolled in that first ‘Writing For Pleasure And Profit’ class tutored by
Barbara Dynes I would still be talking about writing, instead of actually doing
it.